


Phoenix Records

by seriesofvignettes



Category: Empire Records (1995), Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Muggle, Alternative Universe - Empire Record, Angst, Anxiety, Crossover, F/M, Fluff, M/M, Out of Character, Queer Themes, Recreational Drug Use, Self-Harm, WIP, Weird references
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-04-26 22:43:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14412087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seriesofvignettes/pseuds/seriesofvignettes
Summary: Remus Lupin runs Phoenix Records, an independent Delaware store that employs a tight-knit group of music-savvy youths. Hearing that the shop may be sold to a big chain, slacker employee Sirius Black bets a chunk of the store's money, hoping to get a big return. When this plan fails, Phoenix Records falls into serious trouble, and the various other clerks, including lovely Draco Malfoy and gloomy Hermione Granger, must deal with the problem, among many other issues.Literally, this is Empire Records but with Harry Potter characters instead and the dialogue and settings and everything else is pretty much the same. This is a WIP and I'm mostly writing this because I love Empire Records so fucking much and I really wish someone already had written this fic, but I'm happy to try to write it myself, though no promises, I'm not the best at writing.





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> [disclaimer: I do not own either HP or ER in any way, shape, or form]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [edited November 15, 2018]

Sirius Black sits at a couch outside Remus Lupin’s office, taking a moment to digest the knowledge that Remus has finally decided to trust him with such an important task: closing the store for the night. It’s been a long time coming, they’ve talked about it more than once and Remus finally thinks that he’s ready. Sirius has known he was ready for this responsibility for a while now, but was happy to let Remus take his time. After all, he knew pushing the man any more than he already did wouldn’t do him any favors. He lets himself relax as he waits for the rest of his coworkers to make their way out of the store; he stretches out legs in front of him, flexing his muscles and lets out a sigh.

Pansy Parkinson sticks her head - beautiful and made up even though it’s been a long day and she should definitely look more rumpled than she is, Sirius has always been jealous of her abilities - through the door and her eyes dart to him, before turning to look around, “where’s Remus?” She asks. He tilts his body towards her, displaying his own tired and disheveled beauty.

“Pansy” is all Sirius says, getting her to focus back on him. He’s smug about where he is right now. He knows how good he looks in his dark turtleneck sweater and tight black skinny jeans that fit him perfectly. She just narrows her eyes at him.

“Sirius, what are you doing in here?” She looks up and down his body, playing into his game. She turns her body towards him, hips exaggeratedly, emphasizing the shortness of her skirt, the visible skin of her lower belly, and pouts her lips enticingly. 

He smiles widely at her, “my life has reached its pinnacle.” He leans back into the couch, encouraging their antics and explains, “Remus’ letting me close the store tonight.”

Her eyes narrow dangerously at him again. “You're kidding,” She states, but he was expecting it and shoots back almost before she can get the phrase out,

“I am not.” 

“That’s a big responsibility, Sirius.” She reminds him as if he doesn’t know and hasn’t been thinking about it for, like, months. 

He shifts his body forward and smirks at her. “Yes,” he answers, and then keeps talking, not letting her get a word in. “But Remus’ rules are extremely simple.” He then goes on to spell them out for her slowly, “Count the money twice… keep my hands off his beer... cigars... and drumsticks.”

She smirks right back at him and his attitude, and bemusedly responds, “my, my, how _wil_ l you remember it all?” They stare at each other for what should be an uncomfortable second but isn’t, before she gets tired of it, him, whatever, and blows him a kiss. She throws a, “good luck, don’t screw it up!” over her shoulder as she turns away. As the door closes behind her, he reaches out and snatches the invisible kiss out of the air. He presses it to his cheek, even though she’s not there to see it. 

Sirius takes the time to admire the room around him. He thinks to himself, amused, _a responsibility like this requires the obedience of a saint_ , before beginning the process of closing up. He takes his time, savoring the emptiness of the store around him. Remus left for the day and Pansy was the last one out and it’s the first time, maybe ever, that he’s been here alone before. Well, he’s been here alone with Remus, but that’s different. The stillness is strange, but poetic in a way, and it’s broken suddenly by a someone tapping at the front doors of Phoenix Records. 

Sirius sees that it’s a woman he doesn’t recognize and turns to ignore her, but she has already seen him so she becomes more insistent and he knows it would be better not to engage at all and eventually she would go away. But there is something in her eyes that gets Sirius to stride across the floor of the store and come closer to her, still not opening the door.

“Hi,” she says, desperately. He tries not to feel a tug of affection towards her.

“No,” he states, “we’re closed.”

She looks at him pleadingly, “I know. Just one thing.”

He suddenly wants so badly to let her in, but he tries to channel some sort of unaffected authority and says, “Guess what time it is. We close at midnight.”

“Don’t send me away.” She says, and he knows immediately that there was never a chance that he would. He looks again at his watch and she pleads with him again, “I know, please.” And he just shakes his head and calmly unlocks the doors to let her in. “You’re an angel,” she coos, and kisses him on the cheek as she walks through the door he holds open for her. 

Her body language changes almost instantly, going from desperate and small to open and attention-grabbing. Sirius follows her through the different CD isles, she skims her hands across them, not really looking for anything yet. She mutters, “I couldn’t look at Lestrange’s face for another second.”

Sirius knows those kinds of words, feels instantly protective towards her, and then apprehensive at how preoccupied she seems to be. He just wants her to find the CD or the record or whatever that she needs in order to feel better about her situation so he can get her out and then finish closing up. He wants to make Remus proud. “Ma’am…” he says quietly over to her.

“I’m just… never marry a truck driver.” She says, turning to look at him with piercing, sad eyes. 

Sirius doesn’t know how to respond, he doesn’t even know her name, so he just says, “okay.” 

She continues, “I mean, you know, going out on calls is one thing… but cruising for accidents every night, I mean - am I wrong?”

Sirius feels so out of his element in this moment. “Ma’am,” he says, and then tries to think of something that might be helpful and blurts out is, “Well towing is a competitive field. Family is also very important. These are complex issues…” he thinks that maybe in a different circumstance and with a different audience he might be received as funny or rude. In this case, however, she doesn’t really seem to hear him at all. Maybe it’s better that way. After all, it’s not like he can offer much other than helping her find the music she needs. And maybe it’ll do her some good just to talk about things that are hard in her life. She surprises him, and chooses to take the ‘conversation’ in a different direction. Sirius realizes belatedly that it's probably the CDs she’s browsing that help pull her out of her emotional funk.

“You know, I studied dance for years.” She looks up and over at him from a CD that she holds up.

“Really?” He asks, a little intrigued, mostly just wishing she would pick what she wants so he could ring her up and this whole thing could be over.

“I auditioned for Cats,” she elaborates as she does a little twirl. 

He smiles at her, “No shit.” 

She grins back and she sways a bit before setting down the album she’s holding and selecting another he assumes she is actually interested in buying. “I love this.”

Sirius takes the CD case from her and flips it over to look at the cover. He should have known this wouldn’t be so easy. “Did you hear it on vinyl? You should hear it on vinyl.” He starts to turn and walk towards the section of the store with all the records - usually, this would be Dean’s thing, but Sirius is pretty good at this kind of stuff too. “It’s a lot better. You should check it out. We have it.”

“Yeah?” She asks, and she falls into step with him.

“You know, many people say that it doesn’t make a difference, but I say it’s the difference that makes it.” He likes the smile she gets on her face after he says that. He gets behind the counter and starts to go through the records to find the relevant one. 

The woman leans on the counter and watches him. Then she says, “Do you think this story is already written? Or do you think a bold and courageous act could change the course of history?” Sirius straightens with the record in hand and looks over at her. Her eyes are distant but he knows she’s feeling a lot of things and that statement holds a lot of weight. It stays with him after she finally pays for the record and leaves the store. He thinks about it as he finishes locking up and goes to Remus’ office. 

It doesn’t take him long to break most of Remus’ rules, but rules are meant to be broken, at the very least, the silly ones for sure. The beer is satisfying going down, but he knows Remus keeps better beer in the house so it’s slightly disappointing. The cigar is nothing much to write home about either, but he enjoys knowing that he’s doing something that he shouldn’t and that won’t make Remus _too_ mad - he’ll shake his head and sigh or maybe yell a little if he’s in the mood, but that’s about it. Finally, he counts the money - twice - just like he’s supposed to. That doesn’t stop him from getting Remus’ drumsticks and messing around with the stacks of cash that sit on the desk, tapping at them aggressively to the beat of the radio he turned on the moment he stepped into the office. 

All in all, Sirius thinks he has been pretty good. The store is clean and closed and quiet, the common area for the staff is organized and swept (though, to be honest, Seamus did most of that before leaving for the day), and he counted the money twice. It’s not like Remus will care about the rest. 

Sirius gets a bit restless. He knows that it’s time to put the money back in the safe and close the office up. Remus won’t wait up for him for much longer since it’s past one o’clock, but it might be nice to have a cup of tea together before the night is officially over. He doesn’t want to leave though. It feels like there is still something he hasn’t done, even though he knows he has done everything he was supposed to and then some. With nothing better to do, Sirius starts rifling through Remus’ desk drawers, just as a way to prolong his time at the desk, when something catches his eyes.

It’s a few sheets of paper stacked on top of each other. What caught Sirius’ attention is the Music Town logo stamped on the top one. Rifling through the papers, he sees a document titled ‘Music Town Franchise Option Agreement’ which is worrying. Even more worrying is the picture of Phoenix Records printed out and the translucent print out of the Music Town store sign which fits perfectly over the storefront when placed on top of the image. Sirius flips through the paper with more urgency, hoping that he is misunderstanding what he is seeing. 

 

“They've got to be kidding,” he mutters. _Remus would never_ , he thinks desperately to himself, _he knows how much this means to me… to us… how could he…? What does this even mean…? Is Fudge responsible for this?_ It has to be that, because there is no way that Remus would be ok with turning Phoenix Records into a Music Town. And Fudge has always just been about the bottom line, and the bottom line is money. All of these thoughts make him think back to the woman he let into the shop, the one whose name he didn’t even manage to get. 

_“Or do you think a bold and courageous act could change the course of history?”_

These words echoing in his head, Sirius weighs his options, though not very carefully. It seems like this is the kind of thing that calls for a bold and courageous act. Maybe he could change the course of history! There has to be a reason why Remus hadn’t told him about the franchise change, probably because he was scared and worried, and it was up to Sirius to fix it! He knows that he can! What Remus needs is money and then he could buy Fudge out and keep Phoenix Records for himself. Sirius knows how to get him that money. 

“In the immortal words of the Doors:” he encourages himself out loud because he needs this, “‘the time to hesitate is through.’”

Making his choice, Sirius stands up abruptly from the desk. He puts out the cigar, chugs the remnants of Remus’ beer and looks down at the messy stacks of money on the table before him. He grabs one of the safe bags and fills it messily, going for speed and efficiency rather than order and organization. He doesn't want to give himself time to think too hard about what he’s going to do and why. Sirius knows that if he allows himself the privilege, he would end up just going home to Remus and asking him to explain everything and there isn't time for that! Phoenix Records is in danger and Sirius is going to be the man to save it!

It’s not until Sirius has officially locked up and straddles his motorcycle that he wonders if he should let Remus know what he’s up to, but pushes the thought aside. It wouldn’t do either of them any favors and besides, Remus is probably starting to head to bed and Sirius doesn’t want to disturb him. Anyway, Remus knows Sirius is a wildcard and won’t question him not coming home. Probably. Whatever.

The roads are clear for the most part as he rushes along them. Sirius’s hair flies out behind him and he feels so real and free as the wind blows around him. He knows he’s going too fast, but can’t find it in himself to be worried about it, after all, he’s making good time and feeling amazing all the while. 

Atlantic City is very much awake when he arrives, the casinos and bars are open and loud, people spilling out of them in laughter and drunkenness and lighter or heavier pockets, depending on their luck. Sirius knows that he’s taking a big risk coming here but he feels the weight of this decision on his shoulders and knows it’s the right one. He has this feeling of invincibility and boldness that is intoxicating.

With that kind of confidence, walking into the first casino that calls to him, Sirius is unstoppable. He passes by an old lady at a line of slot machines and tells her which button to press as he walks by. He can hear the sound of her winning big behind him and grins widely. He walks to a dice table already surrounded by people playing craps. The casino staff member overseeing the game, calls it as it’s ending,

“Craps! End of roll!” Sirius reaches the table and the man sees him, exclaiming, “New roller! Place your bets, please,” at him and the rest of the people at the table, “get your bets down.” Sirius reaches into Remus’ money bag and pulls all of it out. “We have a high roller!” the man says excitedly. 

Sirius grins wider, “Nine thousand, one hundred and four dollars. I counted it. Twice.”

The people around Sirius stare at him, in shock. A woman, blonde and beautiful in a short black cocktail dress leans into him, “I like your style,” she says into his ear.

Sirius turns towards her, “Remus told me to count it twice.” The dealer calls the end of time to place bets and Sirius asks him cockily, “Do I just throw it and get a seven?”

“That would be good, sir.”

A man on the other side of Sirius questions, “Feeling lucky?” and Sirius is overcome with the sheer amount of attention and clarity of purpose that he is experiencing.

“I’m guided by a force much greater than luck,” he states as he takes the dice and prepares himself. The blonde woman kisses his dice hand for him before he throws them. The second it's out of his hand, Sirius knows that he’s won and doesn’t even need to look or hear the staff member shout, “Seven! A winner!” but he definitely appreciates it.

The people around him exclaim to each other and to him about his win and the woman kisses his cheek, “Baby, you are sex!”

Sirius, high from the adrenaline and the win, says, “I know.” And then before he can do anything else, the staff member is calling for another round. Sirius rides the high and agrees to “let it ride.” He prepares to roll another die but a guy next to him stops him,

“That’s an eighteen hundred dollar bet. You sure you know what you’re doing, kid?”

This question feels like everything Sirius has been waiting for. He puffs up his chest and declares, “I know this: that if I win this roll, I will save the place that I work from being sold and the jobs of my friends that work there. Thus striking a blow to all that is evil and making the world a better place to live in.” 

Everyone is looking at him like he’s crazy. Someone asks, “What?” and Sirius remembers suddenly that all these people see is a young man with a shit-ton of cash who just said a bunch of words about things that they don’t know or care about.

“And I’ll...” he casts his thoughts around for a way to cater to his audience, “buy you guys a drink!”

The group around him reacts positively. Sirius gets a bunch of thumps on the back, the woman presses into his side again and there are exclamations of “Party!” and “Okay!” before the staff member reminds them of the fact that the dice have actually yet to be rolled.

Sirius thinks to himself, _Remus… this is for you_ as he prepares to roll the dice and then lets it go.

He hears the number “Two!” being called out and the world shutters around him for a second. “Craps. End of roll!” Sirius stands stock still, but the people around him are moving away. The woman pouts at him and says, 

“You know something, you used to be cute.”

The man on the other side of Sirius reminds her, teasing, “he used to have nine thousand dollars.”

Sirius is in shock, but he says, almost defensively, “I wonder if I’ll be held responsible for this.” No one answers him and he realizes that it’s time to go and that he failed.

He barely remembers having to leave Remus’ money behind and the casino itself. On autopilot, he rides his motorcycle back to Phoenix Records, his mind a mess of hopelessness and anxiety. The wind doesn’t feel freeing or beautiful, instead, it bites his face and whips at his hair harshly. He doesn’t feel like he could do anything. All he can think about it what Remus’ face is going to look like when he realizes that Sirius failed him so spectacularly. There would be no coming back from this.

By the time Sirius arrives back at Phoenix Records he is emotionally and physically exhausted. It’s pushing five o’clock in the morning and the sky is getting lighter by the minute. He considers his options as he parks his bike, and slouches down over the handlebars, intending to rest for a moment but within moments, he is fast asleep. The last thought that consciously rolls through his brain is the question the woman, hours and hours before had asked him _“Or do you think a bold and courageous act could change the course of history?”_


	2. Chapter Two

Sirius’ exhausted sleep is rudely interrupted by Harry Potter poking him roughly and asking, “What the hell are you doing here, man?” He raises himself off his handlebars and blinks blearily in the morning sun. Harry is standing to the right of his bike, dressed in a loose checkered shirt with a grey comfy cardigan hanging over his shoulders, his hair is dark and unruly and beautiful, curling down his forehead and towards his heavy, adorable hipster glasses. Seamus Finnegan stands to Sirius’ left in his _Chainsaw Kittens_ tshirt, holding a skateboard, smooth-faced and clearly high on a mind-altering substance. 

Sirius squints at both of them before schooling his features and answers, going for cryptic more than anything, hoping to get his bearings and wake up a little before having to deal with all the shit that happened last night. “Something happened to me last night in Atlantic City.”

Harry looks a bit shocked and blurts out, “you were in Atlantic City?” 

Seamus, reacts differently by grinning mischievously, “did you win anything?”

Sirius frowns, “No. I did not win.” He straightens, looks at Harry meaningfully and states, “So, if you guys ever wonder if it was nice to know you…” Sirius nods then turns his head forward, not willing to see Harry’s face as it falls even more, and revs the engine, “I tell you now that it was.”

Before he can start driving away, Harry askes, panicked “Shit, man, what happened?” When Sirius doesn’t answer right away, he repeats the question, louder this time.

Sirius doesn’t know how to tell him the truth, he blurts out the first thing that comes to his mind, a little louder so that Harry can hear him over the engine, “I do not regret the things I’ve done, only those I did not do,” and then drives away, off to find somewhere to deal with all of this and figure out what the next move is. How to keep Phoenix Records from becoming a Music Town. How to make up for the damage he has caused. How to tell Remus what he’s done.

Harry calls after him, “Sirius, how much? How much?!” but when he doesn’t get a response, he turns towards Phoenix Records and mutters, “shit” under his breath.

“What do you mean by ‘shit’? What’s up, huh?” Seamus questions confusedly and Harry doesn’t want to tell him because Seamus isn’t great at keeping secrets, especially from Remus, especially when he’s high, which is basically always, but he doesn’t have the heart to think up some kind of fib this early in the morning and Seamus deserves to know.

“Well, Sirius doesn’t have any money, and Remus let him close the store last night,” Harry explains, hoping Seamus will get it without him having to say anything more.

“Yeah so?” Seamus asks, before he thinks it through and looks scared, but giggles, “Oh! I guess he didn’t live up to his responsibility, did he?”

But now Harry is distracted, Remus is pulling up outside the storefront in his gray GTO convertible, top down, looking tired and windswept, and just says, “No, not the full responsibility.” 

As Remus gets out of the car and slams the door behind him, Harry tells Seamus to shut up before they both great Remus loudly. Harry is not sure how much Seamus understands about what is going on, which honestly is ok with him - at least for now. 

“What’s up with the boss threads, man?” Seamus asks, and Harry’s not sure what that means and smiles at Seamus’ weirdness. 

Remus, though, is grumpy, and stomps towards the door of Phoenix Records. He says, “Friggin’ Gilderoy Lockhart Day,” darkly as he begins to unlock it. 

Seamus smiles, asks, “What’s with the hostility, man?” and starts singing _**say no more, mon amore**_. Remus glares at him as he opens the door to let them all in. Harry pulls his bag and bicycle inside, and Seamus keeps singing, _**I’ll bring my loving right to your front door**_. He ignores Remus’ eye rolls and continued glare, instead kissing his fingers and pressing them to Remus’ lips. Remus just lifts his eyebrows and waits for Seamus to keep walking through the door. Harry doesn’t even try to hide his amusement at his friend’s antics.

Once the three of them are inside, they start making their way to the back but a phone rings suddenly. Remus orders Seamus to go take it. Seamus goes over to the phone and picks it up, not bothering to go behind the counter. 

“Phoenix Records, open till midnight. This is Seamus” He listens for a moment, says, “Yeah,” and then calls to Remus, “Hey, it’s the bank.” Another phone rings as Remus walks back towards the front of the store to grab the phone from Seamus.

“Yeah, it’s Remus,” Remus answers, already frazzled and on the way to very frustrated, as Seamus skips behind the counter to pick up the new call. “Are you sure?” He asks, “It should be.” 

Seamus tries not to overhear as he tells the second caller rather lazily, “Phoenix Records.”

Remus says, “I don’t know, I’ll have to check,” to the bank person he’s talking while Seamus realizes it’s Cornelius Fudge on his line and restates his opening line, to include the store hours and his name - properly and professionally this time, for the sake of his employer and his job. He looks over to Remus and informs him,

“It’s the boss.”

Remus sighs, rolls his eyes, and asks the banker to give him a sec, please, before Seamus transfers the call to his phone. “Yeah, Cornelius,” he says, resigned and then louder, “Cornelius, will you stop yelling, please?”

Seamus walks away as Remus and Cornelius Fudge start arguing through the phone. He’s mostly worked out what’s happened by now - money’s been misplaced, Sirius struck out big in Atlantic City, and Harry is very concerned. Seamus is concerned now, too. 

It’s also becoming clearer and clearer to Remus that something is very very very wrong. Sirius never came home last night and if that wasn’t bad enough, Remus thinks that he shouldn’t have trusted Sirius the responsibility to close the store but his heart aches at this. He needs to find Sirius to understand what happened. But the bank and Fudge already called, worried and angry, and Remus already knows what happened, he just hopes he’s wrong. It’s just, Remus knows Sirius wouldn’t do something so stupid without a good reason - but Remus can’t figure out what that might have been. He needs to talk to Sirius. He needs to understand so that he can figure this whole mess out. 

In the staff room, in the back of the store, Harry sits at a table behind the desk trying to figure out the best way to act like he has no idea what Sirius has done if Remus asks, because Harry knows that he will. “What’s wrong, Remus? What is it, Remus? Oh, what Sirius? No way, come on.” Harry knows he bad at lying, but he will try, for Sirius, at the very least. He practices his surprised, worried faces as Seamus pushes his way into the staff room, doors swinging slowly behind him.

Seamus warns Harry as he enters, “Here he comes.” 

He leans against the back of the couch, facing Harry and picks up a magazine to flip through, feigning nonchalance. Harry pretends like he’s doing something important at the desk, which mostly means he moves a bunch of things around and frowns.

They keep at it as Remus rushes through the doors, grumpiness gone, anger and worry clear on his face. He doesn’t look at his two employees as he strides determinedly towards the copy room where he keeps the safe. Harry and Seamus both wince preemptively as he turns the knob and opens the door. They wince, this time at an appropriate time, when he shouts, “Damn it, Sirius!”

When Remus comes back into the staff room, Harry has never seen him so mad in his entire life. He doesn’t have to pretend when he asks, “What’s the matter, Remus?” and just lets the fear and worry that has been brewing for the past few minutes come to the surface. Remus stares back at him, anger and concern blatantly stamped across his face. 

~

Draco comes tearing down the walk leading to his house, bright pink messenger bag swinging off his left shoulder, huge pink lunch box clutched precariously in both hands, black combat boots swinging by the laces from his left, with his tan coat buttoned up and keeping his skirt from flaring out behind him. Pansy’s been honking for him to come down for a few minutes at this point, impatient but used to it. Draco slows down when he comes to the set of stairs leading down to the road, but descends them as fast as possible. 

“Surprise!” He says as he approaches the car, and extracts a cupcake for her.

Pansy glares at him and asks, “What is it?”

He shoves the cupcake at her again, “Happy Gilderoy Lockhart Day!”

“When did you have time to make these?” She takes the cupcake from him and starts to unwrap it. The white frosting with confetti sprinkles bright and soft and contrasting nicely with the soft yellow of the cake. Draco throws himself into the passenger seat, the mess of messenger bag, boots, lunchbox in his lap.

Draco smiles as Pansy takes a bite and answers, “Dad says there are 24 usable hours in every day. Thank you.”

Pansy rolled her eyes at him and tries not to think about Lucius Malfoy and his insistence on his son’s excellence, regardless of the cost. Pansy loves the cupcakes of course, and the energy Draco puts into everything he does, but she knows the dark circles under his eyes, hidden under layers of makeup, are because of Lucius, just like the pills she knows Draco takes to help his body keep up with his academic demands are his fault as well. Instead of making a dig at Draco’s father’s ridiculous, harmful expectations, she says, “You absolutely amaze me. You are a nerd.”

“That’s me.” Draco declares and turns to sit more securely in the seat as Pansy begins to drive. He shoves his things into the cavity in front of him and pulls out the Gilderoy Lockhart record he's been carrying around in his messenger bag for days. Pansy asks, “So?”

“So,” is all that Draco says, but Pansy keeps prodding at him,

“So today…”

“I will offer myself to Gilderoy Lockhart,” Draco’s face pulls into a grin and Pansy grins enthusiastically at him. He traces Lockhart’s face with his pointer finger, lovingly looking into the face of his absolute favorite musical artist ever.

“All right!” She exclaims.

Draco lifts the record and kisses cover-Lockhart’s lips and says wistfully, “I love you,” to which Pansy rolls her eyes and grabs the record from him.

“No! Like this,” she instructs before bringing it towards her face and licking it outrageously.

“Get your tongue off my record!” Draco admonishes before snatching it back from her and attempting to wipe away her saliva. Pansy laughs raucously and Draco giggles despite himself. He stares down at the face of his love and asks more quietly, 

“Do you think Gilderoy is the right guy for my first time?” He hesitates to ask this, knowing that Pansy is so past the ‘first time’ it’s laughable. His inexperience and ineptitude in the sphere of romance and sex embarrass him to a point but it also thrills him; he’s been saving himself for a man he loves, unwilling to fuck just anyone. Pansy’s never made him feel bad about his virginity, but as reality catches up to his dreams, worries start creeping in. He decided a long time again that he was in love with Gilderoy - his music, his acting, his hair, _everything_ \- and that he would be the one to help Draco lose his virginity. Finally, Draco was going to meet him and finally, he was going to be with the man he loved. But what if it goes all wrong? There is a very small window of opportunity and Draco is playing a precarious game. But Pansy has lots of experience. She knows what she’s doing and she promised to help Draco out. 

Pansy looks over at her friend and allows her smirk to turn into a more loving smile, “I think he’s perfect for you, Draco.”

~

Draco is not the only one thinking about love, in fact, back at Phoenix Records, Harry decides to ask Remus for some advice about the very topic - after the man had calmed down a bit and has had time to breathe obviously (though maybe not enough).

“Remus, I need to ask your advice,” Harry starts and Remus sighs and walks past him, searching through various drawers in the staff room, probably for the money that Sirius misplaced. Harry follows him and keeps talking, “You know a lot about love and men and women* and that sort of thing.”

Remus raises his eyebrows at Harry and reminds him as he walks to a desk and looks through those drawers, “My wife left me for another woman, and my boyfriend* made me leave at gunpoint. Does this qualify me?” He doesn’t mention his quiet crush on Sirius and his inability to say anything to the man, despite the fact that they live together and already love each other. He doesn’t think he’s the best man to give anyone advice on love when his own history and heart is a mess. 

“Definitely,” Harry grins, but schools his features for a more serious expression, even though Remus isn’t looking at him - instead now sifting through items in Sirius’ cubby. Harry clears his thoughts of the worries about Sirius and money and tries to focus on the topic at hand. He’s known he’s been in love with Draco for a while but he hasn’t said anything yet. The original plan had been to confess his love to Draco sometime after Gilderoy Lockhart Day, when all the chaos and fanfare had died down. But he was impatient and madly in love and since today is already going to be a clusterfuck, he figures maybe now more than ever is the best time to do it.

“Look, Remus, I’ve decided that today I am going to tell Draco how I feel about him. I know what you’re thinking and I really am. I’ve been working here on and off for five years, man, so…. I’ve gotta tell him how I feel. You know, I gotta tell him that I, uh…” Harry trails off and Remus sighs again, actually looks at him, and finishes the sentence,

“Love him.”

“Yeah,” Harry nods and inquires, “now, how do I do that?” 

Remus stares at him for a moment before nodding slightly and states, “You say, ‘I love you.’ What, you want written instructions?” And then Remus gets distracted again, thinking about the man that he himself loves and cares about and the fact that he and the money are missing, looking under the cushions of the couch and says (accidentally out loud, though quietly), “If I find that kid, I swear I’ll kill him.”

Harry, undeterred by Remus’ attitude and lack of advice, largely caught up in his own love troubles and worries, declares, “I’ll tell him this morning!”

To which Remus distractedly responds, “Good.” and walks towards his office.

“By noon definitely,” Harry expands and decides, “no, by noon or 1:37. 1:37 exactly, Remus.”

Remus looks over at him and they stare each other down for a moment before Remus smiles and wishes Harry good luck. Harry thanks him and they both walk in opposite directs, Remus into the confines of his office and Harry back into the storefront.

Harry lets his decision sink in. He’s going to tell Draco he loves him, that he’s in love with him and has been for a while. It’ll be a shitstorm of a day, but they’ll find a quiet moment together and everything will go perfectly. 

A few minutes later, Harry notices Pansy’s car turning to park in the parking lot behind Phoenix Records and heads out to meet them before they enter the store. He knows they don’t know what Sirius did and figures it would be better to inform them before they make their way to the staffroom, where Remus was bursting with tension and worry.

He hears them as they get out of the car, singing a few lines of a song together _**...sad girl, be glad you're not a bad girl...**_ , and giggle. Draco says, “God, I remember he sang it in the Family Way…” - Pansy hmms in acknowledgment and starts to open the ‘Employee Only’ door - “I got so excited I almost choked on a pretzel!” But Harry doesn’t let Draco’s ridiculous infatuation with Lockhart derail him from his mission, and he cuts in front of the two friends and pushes the door closed, not allowing them entrance.

“Don’t go in there,” Harry says. Draco wishes him a Happy Gilderoy Lockhart Day and Pansy asks “Why?”

Harry starts to explain as the three of them start walking towards the front entrance of the store, “I got something to tell you. Both of you,” as Draco walks excitedly ahead of them. He turns around, but keeps walking (backward this time, and opening his cupcake box), so Harry continues, “Last night something naughty happened.”

Draco smiles and says, “Happy fifth anniversary, sweetheart!” and Harry was surprised, having forgotten that today marked the fifth year he had been working at Phoenix records. Draco leans over and kisses him on the cheek, which makes him blush. He almost lost his train of thought, but he reoriented himself - they needed to be prepared for Remus and Harry’s love for Draco could wait until 1:37 in the afternoon.

“Hey I gotta tell you what happened to Sirius.”

This time it’s Pansy who got distracted by yelling to a row of houses across the road, “Hey, Ron, wake up!” and Draco joins her. In the distance, Ron Weasley stumbles out his door full with graffiti of all sorts of posters and images and the phrase ‘SEX DRUGS ROCK AND ROLL’ in red. He holds a red and white coffee mug in one hand, guitar in the other. His ginger hair is a mess, his back skinny jeans are on, and his maroon bathrobe is open and hanging loosely off his shoulders, revealing his naked torso. He indicates his awake-ness by lifting the mug to them in mock salute before taking a long drink from it. Draco and Pansy and Harry (reluctantly) wave at him as they continue to talk around to the front of the store.

“A little bit of focus,” Harry says pointedly as he steps in front of Draco and Pansy again, “would make me very happy.” They stop walking and finally give him their full attention. “Thank you,” Harry says, and then begins again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *changed original dialogue - in this case, to indicate Remus being bisexual


	3. Chapter Three

Remus Lupin sits at his desk, fuming and worried in equal measure. He has been trying to reach Sirius Black, his roommate, friend, and (kinda) crush, who he _trusted_ to close Phoenix Records normally, via telephone for the last ten minutes. He calls Grimmauld Place about a dozen times as a few places that he knows Sirius frequents, but he gets no response. Remus even considers trying the bank just to see if maybe Sirius went there with the money or something, but he knows that going down that path would make this entire shitshow even worse.

He decides to try to call home one more time, just in case, _just in case_ , because he fucking _knows_ Sirius wouldn’t do something so stupid without a reason but he just doesn’t know what that reason might be. Maybe Sirius needed the money and didn’t know how to tell Remus what was going on. Like maybe Sirius’ brother decided to run away from the Black family too, and needed money ASAP. Maybe Sirius was being blackmailed by someone, maybe Sirius had a secret girlfriend that he wanted to impress, maybe he had a gambling problem Remus wasn’t aware of… maybe, maybe, but maybe was getting him nowhere fast and so were the phone calls.

“Come on Sirius,” Remus begs the phone as it rings in his left ear, the hand not holding the phone tapping a drumstick against the right side of his face, “pick up the phone. Pick it up.” But the phone just rings and rings, unanswered, and Remus yells into it, “Come on, Buckethead!” before slamming it back down onto the receiver and letting out a loud frustrated breath.

What was he supposed to do? How was he supposed to find Sirius and the money and fix this clusterfuck without Fudge catching on? How was he supposed to save Phoenix Records from becoming a freaking Music Town?

Remus twirls the drumstick between his fingers and tries to figure out what to do next.

~

Meanwhile, Draco, Pansy, and Harry make their way into the staff common area, through a side entrance. Pansy shouts a greeting over to Remus’ closed office door and the other two join her, “What’s up Remus?” “What’s new?” “How you doing?” Remus either doesn’t hear the greetings or doesn’t want to interact with them just yet; he’s shuffling some papers around at his desk and slams them down onto his desk, cursing angrily to himself.

Draco turns to Harry as they walk towards the storefront and asks quietly, “Does Remus know?”

Harry shakes his head and answers, “No, so just act normal.” He absently sticks a finger into the frosting of the cupcake that Draco had handed him earlier to celebrate his fifth year of working in the store, and then licks the sugary sweetness off of it, savoring the taste. He thinks softly of all the labor that Draco put into creating it and allows waves of fondness wash through him.

A few minutes later, the morning crew (plus Draco) are congregated by the staircase that stands and twists boldly from the middle of the first floor of Phoenix Records to the second. Pansy begins the ritual they participate in before starting the process of getting the store ready for the day by opening a box of M&Ms. This is a tradition that Harry has made sure to continue throughout his five years, though the staff had gradually changed over time.

Harry, Draco, and Seamus each take an M&M from the box and Seamus hands it back to Pansy. She runs a few steps up the purple carpeted stairs and pours an M&M out for herself.

Draco says quietly to Harry, “I got green!”

“Let see who goes first!” Pansy exclaims in a sing-songy kind of way, and examines the piece of candy in her hand. “I got a brown! Anyone got brown?” But no one else has one so they all shake their heads and she gets another one out of the box. “Orange!”

Harry and Draco look at each other and shake their heads, but Seamus holds up his M&M between two fingers and grins broadly, eyebrows wiggling exaggeratedly. Everyone groans and Harry mutters, “oh, shit,” but Seamus turns, exuberant, and runs to the large music player. He makes a rude hand gesture their way in answer to the protests before looking around for the CD he wants to start the day off listening to, which turns out not to be that bad of a selection, at least for a little while.

As the lyrics of _‘Seems’_ by _Queen Sarah Saturday_ fill Phoenix Records, they all split up and starts the day. Draco heads over to the mini-kitchen in the staffroom and makes everyone coffee. He pours too much sugar for everyone because that’s how he likes it and they’ll just have to deal and he doesn’t care. Harry makes his way over to the raised counter in the front part of the store that has the phones, computers, and cash registers, wiping down the screens with his sweater sleeves and organizing whatever debris that has ended up there though Sirius was supposed to clean it the night before. Seamus, still riding high and enjoying the song, sweeps in a disorderly but enthusiastic way across the storefront floor. Pansy walks through the aisles, dusting off the CD cases and shelves, her head bobbing up and down on beat with the music.

They’re all being silly, grooving to Seamus’ selection, singing along loudly and mostly out of tune. Pansy gives up her dusting in favor of using the duster like a microphone while Seamus first dances with his broom and then pretends it’s a guitar and plays it. Harry dances in a slightly more subdued manner as he further prepares the registers and organizes several displays.

With the coffee ready, the CLOSED sign flipped to OPEN, and everything as in order as it could ever be, Harry takes the music into his own hands by ejecting Seamus’ CD before it can go to the next song. The blaring alarm that comes out of the music system when someone ejects a disk alerts Seamus of Harry’s actions more than the music stopping.

Seamus runs up to Harry, broom in hand and dragging behind him, and asks, “What are you doing, man?

“Exercising my veto, man” Harry answers, looking around to find the case to return the CD to.

“It’s only nine o’clock, you sure you want to do that?” The rule is, everyone has a chance to stop music someone else is playing, but only once a day, otherwise music would always be interrupted and disjointed which frustrated customers and made everyone grumpy. Usually, only a couple people a day end up exercising their veto power over other people’s music, but it’s always nice to have the option.

Harry holds up the found CD case and lifts his eyebrows, “Listening to this crap will make you sterile.”

Seamus rolls his eyes and mumbles, “maybe I want to be sterile,” as he walks away.

Harry snorts, amused, at this friend’s retreating form, before picking up the CD, and then pulling out a lighter. He ignites it and uses the small flame to burn a part of the back of the CD before returning it to its case.

~

Remus, looking for something other than Sirius to focus on, leaves his office quietly. He notices Draco hunched over a table off in the corner of the staffroom, scribbling furiously in the notebook in front of him next to a textbook bright with lines of different color highlights. This isn’t the first time that Draco has come into work hours before his shift starts, but Remus feels as though he should check in with him anyway especially because he knows how much pressure Draco is under to do well in school. He walks over and leans on the wall beside the table and asks his employee,

“Draco, what are you doing here?”

Draco flinches in surprise at Remus’ and turns to Remus, “Calculus. I hate it, but my father says I’ve got to get an A.” He taps a tiny rhythm onto the notebook with his pen.

“You’re not on until this afternoon,” Remus reminds him, but Draco smiles at him with enthusiasm (that has, in Remus’ eyes, been made heavy by the weight of school responsibility and parental pressure).

“Remus, it’s Gilderoy Lockhart Day!”

To which Remus nods, knowingly, understanding Draco’s infatuation with the pop star. “Gilderoy Lockhart Day,” he says with a grimace at the very idea. He leaves Draco to his homework.

But Draco, distracted by Remus’ prodding and the reminder of how special and important this day is to him, gets lost in thoughts of the star in question. He leans his head on his right hand and stares off into the middle distance, daydreaming of Gilderoy’s newest music video:

_“Oh, Gild-y, your so sexy,” **a curly haired woman says into the phone as the sounds of Gilderoy Lockhart’s 1995 hit-single-turned-music-video,** Say No More, Mon Amour. **The scene fades to one where Lockhart is dancing with her on the beach and white linens flow in the wind around them.** “You call me on my car phone with that je ne sais quoi” **He sings, as women with bushy hair of different colors dance around him, silhouetted against the billowing linens. The picture returns to Lockhart’s face as he croons,** “You say you need a little of my Oo-la-la”_

__

_**Draco envisions himself in place of a dark haired women, clad in a tiny black cocktail dress, on a huge bed in the middle of the beach. Lockhart sing, “I know you get lonely in your canopy bed” **as he crawls into the bed with Draco and puts his hands all over him and his dress. Around them, white linen flutters and women also dressed in black dance with each other.**** _

****

__

****

_**Again, the focus is on Lockhart and his white ruffled shirt tucked into a black vest, as he continues,** “Well say no more, baby, I’ll be runnin’ every red!” **Then Lockhart is joined by two women for the chorus,** “Say no more, mon amour…”_

****

Suddenly, Seamus jostles Draco and rouses him from his daydream, asking him if he’s ok. Draco tells him what it was about, and Seamus’ entire face lights up. He suggests that they dance out the music video – because he knows they can and it would be a fun way to kick off Gilderoy Lockhart day. Draco grudgingly agrees at first because he's embarrassed, but later is grateful for the energetic distraction. Pansy joins Seamus and Draco as they dance to the chorus **_“I’ll bring my lovin’ right to your front door.” Seamus leaves the two of them to the rest of it, bouncing away to ** _“Here I come, baby j’ite adore…”_**_**

****__

****

Feeling more loose and awake, when the song is over Pansy and Draco return to the tasks they were doing; Pansy heads over to the register and Draco rushes back into the staff room to continue studying his least favorite subject. 

****

~

Across town, back at Malfoy Manor, Lucius Malfoy is sitting at his dining room table, indulging in a large breakfast. The butler strides in with quiet purpose and a tray of mail. He places the letters and such on the table and whisks away Mr. Malfoy’s empty coffee cup in order to refill it in a side room. Malfoy absently picks at the letters in front of him, tossing aside advertisements and the like while creating separate piles for bills and personal letters to Mrs. Malfoy. Towards the end of the stack, Malfoy finds a letter addressed to Draco with a Harvard stamp on it and begins to open it, before remembering how upset Draco had been when his father had opened his letters from Princeton and Columbia. He drops it like it might burn him. He’s been worried, recently, about his and Draco’s relationship - worried that he might be pushing his son too far but also frustrated with the types of people Draco chooses to waste his time with. Unwilling to strain their relationship further, he decides to have Draco open the letter himself. He calls for Draco’s adopted brother, Theodore Nott, to join him in the dining room. He orders Theo to go over to Phoenix Records, have Draco open the letter, and report back as fast as humanly possible.

****

A few minutes later, Theo tears down the road on his bike, full speed ahead, letter pressed between his lips for safekeeping and easy access. When he arrives at Phoenix, he doesn’t even bother to secure the bike, preferring to drop it on the sidewalk and run for the storefront doors. He goes to the first employee he sees, which happens to be Pansy, behind the register and exclaims, out of breath,

****

“Pansy, I got to find Draco right away!”

****

Pansy rolls her eyes at Theo and then calls Draco over the loudspeaker, “Paging Mister Draco Malfoy. Meet your smelly brother in the rotunda.” And Theo flips her off before jogging towards the staff room doors, as Draco steps through them. He says to him, a little less breathlessly,

****

“Dad said to bring this to you right away.” Theo slows down and hands Draco the letter with two hands, “can’t wait to see what’s in it” he enthuses as Draco turns the letter over and sees the insignia.

****

Draco smiles brightly and calls to Harry, who is off near the records section, “it’s Harvard!”

****

Pansy makes her way from the register over to the two Malfoys. She and Harry exchange a look before refocusing on Draco. She knows they're thinking the same thing – they both want Draco to get everything he wants, but they also don’t want to let him go, at least in their own ways.

****

Oblivious to his friends' mounting anxiety, Draco smiling painfully, expresses his own, “I’m afraid to open it.” But he starts to open it anyway and Pansy and Harry exchange another knowing look.

****

As Draco reads over the Harvard letter, Theo, Pansy, and Harry all watch him, concern and excitement almost palpable in the air between them.

****

Unable to wait any longer, Harry asks, “Well? Did you get in?”

****

“Do they want you?” Pansy probes when Draco doesn’t answer.

****

Draco looks up then, eyes shining and says “Yah” at the same time that Theo asks, “What’s it say?” Draco rushes forward and grabs Theo, kissing him on the forehead, “Yes!” he says, stepping back and rereading the letter.

****

“Are you sure?” Pansy asks, but Harry exclaims, “Oh, my God, wow, you did it!” and does a strange little jump.

****

Theo hugs his brother around the waist quickly, before running out of the store, presumably to go tell Malfoy the happy news.

****

“There is such a thing as a phone you know!” Pansy calls after him, and gets flipped off again.

****

Harry bounces over to Draco and pulls him into a tight hug too which Draco returns with enthusiasm.

****

Pansy tries to paste a happy, excited smile onto her face, “It’s awesome,” she tries, “you’re getting out of here! Yes!” but before Draco can see how upset this entire situation makes her, Pansy grabs the loudspeaker and turns it on for the whole store to hear.

****

“Ladies and gentlemen, our most _valued_ employee, Draco Malfoy… is going off to secure the future of the free world.” She says as Harry and Draco bounce and laugh together happily. Then she cheers, “Harvard! Harvard! Harvard! Mr. Malfoy, you just got into Harvard. What are you going to do now?” Pansy tilts the microphone over to him.

****

Draco grins at his oldest friend and tries to come up with an answer, “I’m going to…” he pauses, “throw up.”

****

Harry and Pansy exchange yet another look at this, but then together try to help Draco come to terms with this new development positively, even though they both are struggling with it.

****

~

****

****  


 

Remus returned to his desk a little while ago and is going over papers to take his mind off this Sirius business. He is interrupted by Seamus who opens his office door. Remus folds his hands together on the desk in front of him. He knows Seamus knows _something_ , he isn’t sure what, but he knows that Seamus and Harry know at least a little about what Sirius did, he just has to get it out of him, which shouldn’t be too difficult.

****

“Remus, the sign’s out,” Seamus starts, “on the roof.” He gestures with his hands nervously and does not move to step inside the room. “Just went dead for some reason. It’s weird.”

****

Remus sits quietly, looking directly into Seamus’ eyes, letting him percolate in the silence.

****

“Come here, Seamus.” He says quietly. Seamus hesitates and then takes a mini step past the doorframe. “Come here,” Remus says again and Seamus walks forward a little more, his eyes getting wider with every inch, his forehead creasing in worry. He wants to keep Sirius’ secret, at least for a little while longer, but he knows it’s futile – Remus knows him too well and he’s a bit too high and he’s never been that good at keeping things quiet anyhow no matter how important it is. “Come closer,” Remus beacons him with a single finger, “Come on in, Moose*.” Seamus, knowing he's in trouble when he hears that old nickname, almost turns and walks out the door, but instead, he lets his mouth fall open and tells Remus about what happened that morning.

****

 

****

~

****

 

****

It doesn’t take very long for Seamus to tell Remus everything he knows and Remus, already frustrated to begin with, is just so done at this point. He leads Seamus out of his office and walks purposefully into the storefront and towards Harry and Draco who are at the register; Draco sits in an empty section of countertop between the till and the computer, blowing bubbles from a pink plastic container, with his skirt bunched up high on his thighs (which Harry purposefully distracts himself from by popping the bubbles that float by his head.).

****

“Pansy, Seamus,” Remus calls over his shoulder. Pansy is by a CD aisle and Seamus is a couple of steps behind Remus, looking down at the tiled floor shamefully. The two of them move towards the register at Remus’ command.

****

Harry greats Remus with a “Hello, Remus” but jumps when he grabs his shoulders from behind, as he had stepped up to the register platform.

****

“Harry,” Remus says, “I want you to find Sirius.”

****

Still unsure what Remus knows, Harry plays for innocent and asks, “What do you mean, ‘find Sirius’?”

****

“What do you think I mean?” Remus challenges, hands still gripping the back of Harry grey sweater.

****

Seamus owns up then, feeling so so guilty and not wanting Harry to fall deeper into this conspiracy: “I told him. What was I supposed to do?” he pleads with Harry, “The guy threatened me.”

****

“Christ, Seamus. You’re killing me, man,” Harry complains, but he knew this would happen eventually. Remus just shakes his head and releases Harry.

****

“You find him and bring him here to me,” Remus commands, then turns to Draco, “Draco, since you’re here, take over Harry’s register.” Draco leaps down from the table and nudges Harry aside with his hip. Remus steps off the platform and pushes Seamus back towards the staffroom, “Seamus! Work. Pansy! –“

****

“I know,” she calls over to him, “Work!” and heads back to where she had been before.

****

Harry starts walking towards the staffroom as well, not really sure what to do. He spins and shares a look with Draco who give him a thumbs up, which he shrugs his shoulders at and keeps on walking. Just as Harry begins to let out a long sigh, he hears someone jump down from somewhere behind him. He whirls around and comes face to face with Sirius, still clad in his leather motorcycle jacket, black turtleneck sweater, and tight black skinny jeans, looking tired by mostly normal despite the events of the night before.

****

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Moose is a nickname for Seamus (someone told me) which I think is fitting and cute. The script of the movie, in this scene, Joe calls Mark Markie and it's the only time he's called that I think. But introducing this nickname helps me with Seamus' storyline later, at least in this fic, because it's the only way I could figure out how to do Mark's band thing coherently using Seamus' name.


	4. Chapter Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [edited Nov. 28, 2018]

“Holy Shit!” Harry exclaims and takes an involuntary step back, “how the hell did you get in here?”

Sirius straightens his leather jacket and simply states, “roof,” before peeking around Harry toward the staff room, “Is Remus in there?”

Harry places a hand on Sirius chest and gets his attention back. “Have you thought about what’s going to happen?”

“Have _you_ thought about what’s going to happen, Harry?” Sirius retorts, turning away from him and jumps onto the purple staircase before looking back. Harry follows up, stepping on the stairs and into Sirius’s personal space.

“What the hell are you talking about?” He demands, slightly amused and highly worried. Sirius ascends another step. Harry notices that he is holding a white and purple bucket in one hand as he gestures pointedly with the other.

“I’m talking about your future, Harry!”

“My future?”

“Five,” Sirius exclaims, spreading five fingers in the air, and shoves them at Harry’s face for emphasis. “Five years.” Harry nods a bit, thinking he's getting the gist of what Sirius is trying to say. He steps into Sirius’s space again, grabs a hold of his forearm, and leads them up a couple of steps. 

Sirius allows this and continues, “We need to talk about your future and forget about mine right now. My life is a package tour. I’m simply the passenger.” He pulls away and Harry lets him, confused again, but trying to go along with this whole thing.

“Okay, then where do you end up, Sirius?” Harry asks. Sirius smiles a bit.

“That’s the mystery. Do you know how many people there are out there?”

“About six billion.”

“Really? Six billion. That’s a lot of people.” 

Realizing that he is actually not going to get a straight answer out of the man, Harry changes tactics. He sighs loudly and catches Sirius’ eyes, “Look, Remus sent me to find you… so should I?” He steps back down toward the store, kind of hoping that Sirius will follow him but at the same time a little relieved when he does not.

“Find yourself,” is the answer Sirius dines to provide, “I’m right here.” He flings his arms out cockily, bucket still in the left hand, and looks out at the store. Harry wants to reason with him, he really does, but he understands that Sirius needs to figure this out on this own. He won’t ‘find’ Sirius, instead, he’ll let Sirius find himself for Remus, like Harry knows he will.

~

Back in the staff room, Seamus is sweeping the floor, nevermind that it has already been swept. He isn’t really paying attention to what he’s doing anyway and instead, singing to himself the Rex Manning song line that has been stuck in his head all morning. The broom dances around with him. Remus, pouring over some documents in his office, can hear the off-key serenade and finally gets fed up after a few line repetitions of ****  
_up to your front door. lips are for kissing, baby, so say no more_  
get progressively louder and more intense.

Rolling his eye indignantly, Remus calls over to his employee through the open door, “Moose, could you please not sing?”

Seamus, startled out of his enthusiastic movements, steps forward and frowns, “You know what, Remus? One of these days, I’m going to show you little people.” He gestures with the broom to make his point and then begins to sweep again, furiously

Remus looks back down at the papers on his desk and says, “yeah and on that day, I’ll jump out of my wheelchair and dance.”

“How about today?” Seamus responds as he begins to walk away, “Gilderoy Lockhart Day.” Just as he goes towards the couch to slump down and do nothing for a moment, Sirius and Harry burst through the double doors. Seamus mumbles, “uh oh.” 

“Seamus!” Sirius says, before flinging him a quarter from inside a bucket he’s carrying under one arm. Harry follows Sirius in quietly, unsure of what is going to happen.

Remus hears the commotion and permits himself a moment, just a moment, to collect his thoughts and anger before standing up from his desk and heading out into the staffroom. His head is full of Sirius, and so is his focus. “Sirius!” He bites out, loudly. 

“Remus!” Sirius exclaims in the return, not letting himself be cowed by Remus’ irate nature.

“Where’s the money?” Remus demands, pushing toward Sirius, eyes blazing and curly brown hair disheveled. 

Sirius gazes into his face, his own blank and unreadable, “The money is gone.” 

“Yeah, I know it’s gone. Where’s it gone to?” As Remus says these words, he advances on Sirius, much like Harry had a few minutes ago, stepping into his space and refusing him refuge from his anger. Sirius shuffles back, keeping an even distance between them. Harry and Seamus are spectators to the interaction; Harry, worried, fidgets the sleeves of his sweater, while Seamus looks on in shock and interest, broom hanging limply from his hand.

“Atlantic City,” Sirius states as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. He even lets out a little chuckle. Remus understands this as a defense mechanism and it infuriates him. How can this beautiful, ridiculous man be such a fucking asshole. _What is Sirius playing at? What is going on?_ These questions blare over and over in his mind, neon signs that refuse to blink out.

Well if Sirius is going to play this game, then Remus will too - at least until it becomes unbearable. “Is it coming back from Atlantic City?”

“I don’t think so.”

“What’s it doing in Atlantic City?”

“Recirculating.” Finally, Sirius stops moving backward, and Remus allows this, standing firmly in front of him instead. 

Remus repeats, “recirculating,” under his breath. He looks down at Sirius’ open face, as he nods, and then smacks the bucket to the ground. The coins spill out and break through the brief beat of silence that fills the room. Sirius glances down at the mess at their feet, before meeting Remus’ eyes again. “Remus, are you pissed off?”

Shocked by this, Remus’ temper boils over and he grabs Sirius’ shoulder with bruising force. He pulls at the leather and the material of the turtleneck beneath, which tightens against Sirius’ throat. “Remus, Remus,” he says. 

“Sirius, listen to me.” He pulls Sirius closer, so that their faces are nearly touching and his next words are directed at his left ear. “I told Fudge that you forgot to deposit the money, I told him the money was still here.” 

“Remus, that’s not true, It’s in Atlantic City.” And Remus has had enough. He throws Sirius away from him and onto the yellow couch.

“I swear,” Remus begins and then swallows his words. He refuses to entangle himself in Sirius’ antics for another second. He can wait until Sirius decides to be an adult and takes responsibility for his actions. Remus wishes desperately for his bed at home, suddenly, wanting warmth and comfort and not to have to deal with this ever at all. But then Sirius opens his mouth, and Remus just cannot right now.

“Shut up, sit down, and don’t you move,” He commands, pointing with an open hand at the couch. Sirius looks down at his knees. “Under no circumstances do I want you to leave that couch,” Remus continues, “unless it’s to get me nine thousand dollars, then you bring it here to me.”

Sirius nods, his red lips pushing out sadly, and Remus turns away. He stomps back into his office and is about to close the door, when Sirius speaks up again, “Remus. Remus! I think it’ll be ok.”

Remus spins around and places his hands on his hips, “oh, yeah? And what makes you think that?” 

“Who knows where thoughts come from? They just appear,” Sirius says in his horrible, matter of fact way. Remus rolls his eyes to the ceiling and prays for patience. Sirius makes his polite-employee smile and nods.

“What a moron,” Remus cannot help but mutter to himself, as he turns away again and slams his door shut behind him. The blinds on his door window bounce around at the aggressive treatment, on them, the word “WORK,” written in red duct tape that had been applied years ago, seems to laugh at the whole situation. Sirius stares after at the door for a hard moment, wondering if he did the right thing, before he relaxes against the couch and settles down, preparing for a long tenure.

 

~

At the register, Pansy is busy helping a short, balding man complete his purchase. Saddened by the exchange in the staffroom, Harry left once Remus had slammed the door. He gave Sirius a consoling pat on the shoulder before making his way out. He now steps up into the register platform and around Pansy, hoping for relief.

“So… what did you and Draco do last night?” He asks, curious and leaning against the other counter. She glances over at him with a tiny smirk, and continues to tap at the keyboard in front of her. The customer observes their interaction, his mustache quivering slightly as he breathes.

“Well, it was Friday night, so we went to a club,” Pansy began, silkily, putting the purchases in a bag and informs him of the cost. “Then we met this group of gorgeous guys… who invited us back to their frat house for a few beers.” The customer hands her a twenty, so she counts out the change as she continues to share, “I think it got a bit out of hand. ‘Cause we ended up in a Jacuzzi… in our panties… with all of them…”

Harry flushing pink at the story, pushes away from the counter, and mumbles, “sorry I asked…” He always wants to hear about Draco and what he does, but listening to Pansy describe such a scene makes him uncomfortable and sad and a bit jealous. He doesn’t want her to see this on his face, so he begins to walk away. But she pushes him back, hand firm on his chest.

She says, “What do you think he did last night? He went _home_ , Harry, like he always does. I, on the other hand, got stuck with two gorgeous men.” Here Harry decides it truly is time to go. He walks away briskly as Pansy continues, “Big men. _Huge_ men.” The customer smiles at her lascivious words, accepts the bag of his purchases she extends to him and nods at her dismissive, “Have a nice day.”

~

As the morning drags on, Harry can’t help but seek Draco out. He knows it’s not the right time yet, but Draco’s all over the store. Draco stops every once in a while to pick up a pair of headphones to listen to the music on display in the various isles, and Harry almost approaches him a few times, the words sticky on the tip of his tongue. And every time he opens his mouth, he chickens out and has to walk away quickly before Draco notices he was there in the first place. He’s not very subtle about it, though, and after the first two times, Draco catches on, and lets it happen. He doesn’t really know what Harry is up to, but he appreciates the attention, even if it’s unresolved, and likes the weird, ridiculous shuffle he does when he thinks he’s stealthily getting away. 

Seamus too, had found his way out of the staffroom - with a duster. He made it his mission to dust every surface he could reach and hoped that Remus would forget about him and not give him other, more laborious work to complete. 

On a small platform at the bend in a staircase at the far left of the storefront, a girl with beautiful red hair in a high ponytail is listening to music through huge black headphones attached by a curly wire to the wall. Her eyes are closed, and, overtaken by the emotion and beauty in the music, dances elegantly to it. Seamus smiles as he dusts the wall around her and tries to place a kiss on her cheek, she’s so mesmerizing. He brings her out of her revelry, however, when she extends her hand and accidentally hits him with it in the face. They smile awkwardly at each other and Seamus turns away, face burning. The girl returns to her music, and tried to get in the grove of it again. He starts to walk away once he finishes dusting the shelves, but her leg, which she kicks up in ballet-like professionality, catches him in the stomach. He grabs her foot, shocked, and they look at each other again, uneasy but amused. Seamus hams it up for her, so she doesn’t feel like she should stop dancing, by dusting the foot in his hand and then bringing it up to his lips for a quick kiss. She giggles, confused, as he lets her leg go and skips away, 

She’s not the only one dancing in Phoenix Records. It’s a normal thing to see customers moving to music through headphones or over the loudspeaker. Sometimes the workers join in because nothing enhances the experience of listening to music like being able to dance to it. As Harry wanders the store, he witnesses a regular dancing with CD in hand and heavy black listening device securely on her head. The mailwoman bops to _Romeo and Juliet_ by the _Dire Straights_ on the PA system without shame as she delivers several packages and a handful of letters.

A guy with a huge bouquet of flowers, who is decidedly not dancing, arrives by the time Draco got bored of Harry’s attention and made his way to the register to hang out with Pansy. 

“Are you Draco Malfoy?” he asks, and Draco smiles widely, “For me?” The flowers are beautiful, fresh and white with bright yellow centers and soft green leaves. The delivery man hands them over and says, “Later!”

“Oh, bye, thank you,” Draco calls after him. Pansy plucks a small white envelope from the bouquet and reads it out loud.

“‘To the number one in his class, Harvard 1990. Make me proud! Love Daddy.’ That’s sweet.”

Draco is none too pleased, “God, nothing’s ever enough for him.”

“He didn’t mean it like that,” Pansy tries to reason, “I’m sure he didn’t.” But she knows her words are empty. Lucius Malfoy always demanded so much of his son, no matter how much he achieved. Pansy knew the knots that Draco twisted himself into trying to impress the man, and didn’t know how to reassure him. Her own family situation was such a different kind of disaster it was almost laughable. 

After this small exchange of words and flowers, a woman approaches the counter, her intricate hoop earrings swinging lightly as she comes to a stop, holding several CDs in her hand. She waits for a few moments, expectantly, but then gets fed up with being ignored. “Excuse me,” she says, pointedly, and Draco jumps at the opportunity to help her out and escape thoughts about his father.

“Hi, how are you today?” He says, brightly, the smile on his face, once delighted, is now strained. The customer does not seem to care as she hands him her purchases.

Seamus truly is having a strange shiny morning. Once he finishes dusting, he grabs several empty cardboard boxes from storage and takes them to the back patio. He shoves them into a mesh trash can, dropping a few in the process, and has to get on his hands and knees to reconcile them. He cracks his fingers after completing this task, easy as it was, and turns back towards the building. Harry’s most recent mural catches his eyes. It’s a stunning painting for Madonna with curly blonde/light brown hair, a seductive glimmer in her eyes, and red pouting lips bright against the backdrop of faded red bricks of the building. Seamus momentarily falls in love. He bounces towards her, and hugs the wall as if hugging her. He slides down onto his knees, so that his face is level with her gorgeous mouth and kisses at the red paint enthusiastically. The horniness matching his high is overwhelming and Seamus feels weightless. He grins madly as he pushes away from the mural and stumbles back into the record store.

~

Hermione Granger is not having a good morning. After a terribly long and disappointing night and a horrible breakfast, the ride from home to Phoenix Records can be marked down as a disproportionately frustrating experience. Furious beyond explanation, she rides determinedly past the murals of musicians and graffiti marking the store’s outer walls. Hermione ignores Ron’s lazy “Hi, Hermione” from where he is sitting at his trailer door, still in his crimson robe and half-naked, and strumming at his red electric guitar. 

Hermione parks her yellow motor scooter in the usual spot and stomps her way through the front doors of the shop. She takes off her white helmet, shakes out her short unkempt, massively curly dark hair, gives Draco the finger when he says, “Hi, Hermione,” and does not pause as she reaches the staffroom double doors. 

Back at the register, Draco turns to Pansy and complains, “She hates me.” to which she replies, “Yeah, she hates me too, but I have enough sense to hate her back.” And Draco knows she’s right. It’s just, Hermione is one of Harry’s friends, and he can’t understand why he can’t get in good with her. Sure, the first year or so of their employment together had been rough and they hadn’t gotten along that well. But Draco had grown up, and worked hard to try unlearning some of his father’s ideology. Harry had forgiven him and become a fast, wonderful his friend, so why couldn’t Hermione? Pansy never really changed, but she never really needed to and it was Hermione’s loss for not seeing how great they both were.

Hermione just did not care. Her black leather coat slips off one shoulder and exposes her thin bone structure along with the grey tank top that adorns it and the black bra strap. With white helmet under the other arm and her dark grey jeans high, wide, and fluttering over he combat boots, she makes her way into the staffroom. Sirius still sitting on the couch, now joined by Harry, who is on the floor, gluing the fallen coins to the carpet, both call greetings to her which she turns away from. They watch, slightly taken aback by her attitude, as she marches directly to the bathroom and slams the door closed behind her. The alien head sticker plastered on it looks mockingly back at the two men. They look at each other, acknowledging their mutual confusion and concern at their friend’s behavior. It’s not as if Hermione is the calmest person in the world, but it isn’t like her to be so brusque.


	5. Chapter Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning: there is discussion of self-harm and dark thoughts in this chapter

Remus hears the slamming of a door and is jolted into action. He opens his own and looks out at the staffroom again. His vision is met with the image of Sirius who he left sitting on the couch, looking a bit put out at Remus’ anger.

“Sirius,” Remus asks, “are you in trouble?” He marches down the handful of steps from his office to the larger room, “do you need money?” and makes his way over to the couch to sit next to the man in question, who won’t meet his eyes. “If you are in trouble, you can talk to me. You know that.” 

“Remus, we’re all in some kind of trouble.” Sirius responds, turning to look at him, “am I the only one who sees it? You know, Herm’s in trouble, Harry’s in trouble,” he gestures towards Harry, still on the floor gluing down coins.

“Harry’s not in trouble,” Harry interjects, raising a finger, uncomfortable but also a bit amused. He shifts his position to reach another coin, a tube of glue gripped loosely in his right hand.

“And Draco is in trouble,” Sirius continues.

Harry shakes his head and interrupts again, “He’s not in trouble, he’s going to Harvard.” He smiles down at his art project, remembering the face that Draco made when he found out.

Undeterred, Sirius continues, “Moose’ in trouble. Dean’s in trouble…”

“Hey, I’m the one who’s in trouble here,” Remus remarks, cutting Sirius off effectively. “‘Cause every minute that goes by and I don’t call the cops, I look like a bigger bananahead.” He holds Sirius attention seriously, and with his left hand, bent and leaning against the back of the couch, gesticulating to emphasize the point.

With the same air of seriousness, Sirius assures him, “Remus, I can categorically say that you are not a bigger bananahead.” Harry cannot help but let out a small chuckle at those words, a bit shocked at his friend’s audacity.

“You screwed me, Sirius,” Remus says, unamused and unmoved, “You know that right? What do you want me to do? Call Cornelius? Tell him I lied?”

Sirius' eyebrows draw together as he says, still serious, “It _seems_ to be a viable option.”

And Remus just as to stare at him for a beat. _Jesus Christ Sirius_ he allows himself to think, and hears himself say, “I swear to God, if you’re fooling with me, I will kill you.” 

Sirius has his hand up to his face, fingers bracketing his mouth in a contemplative manner. He nods slightly in acknowledgment of Remus’ threat. Remus shifts his body, standing up from the couch and turning towards the boy with glasses sitting on the floor, “Harry, I need another closer”

“I opened, man,” Harry says, standing up as well.

Remus reasons with him, “Come on, I wouldn’t ask… but I have got no choice.” 

Sirius looks between the two men while they both ignore him. He says, “I can close,” and Remus glares down at him. 

Harry readjusts his grey sweater hanging off his shoulders so it sits a little easier, and chuckles again. Sirius really is doing everything he can to get under Remus’ skin, Harry does not want to get in the middle of it. 

“Yeah, I can close. It’s cool,” He directs to Remus, who continues to glare. Harry shrugs, “they just raised my rent, so I could use the money.”

“Damn the man!” Sirius exclaims from his spot on the couch. 

And Remus is done, “Oh, God, I am in hell!” He storms back into his office once more, leaving the Harry and Sirius behind.

~

As Draco holds up a small compact mirror and begins to apply Pansy’s deep red romantic lipstick* to his already plump, pretty lips, Pansy reads to him about Gilderoy from a magazine that he’s poured over a million times already. In it is an interview of Gilderoy Lockhart with Xenophilius Lovegood from about three years ago. “Okay, it says here that he never kills insects because he believes that they have souls…” Draco tilts his head from left to right, checking out his lips from all angles. He smiles at the fact and nods. Pansy continues, “He hates the color orange. And he loves to drive _real fast_.” They both giggle, Pansy does so with a bit of sarcasm. “So work that into the conversation,” she advises, before setting the magazine to the side.

Draco puts away the mirror and marvels at the future, “Okay. God, I’m really going to do this.”

“Yeah, you’re seventeen”

“Yeah, you’re right.” 

Pansy smiles at him, “I’ve had a lot of luck with this red lipstick.” She lets out a little scream of excitement and Draco beams in response. “Looks great. Looks great!” Draco raises his eyebrows happily and his eyes scrunch up a bit. “You look beautiful.”

“Thank you,” Draco says, shrugging slightly at the compliments.

“It’s so great, it’s like all the planets are aligned or something,” Pansy says, brushing her bangs to the side with her left hand as she does. With her right hand, she reaches for her makeup bag. “It’s the perfect guy. Perfect boy,” she brings a makeup brush up to Draco’s face and starts applying blush to his cheeks, he smiles so she can make sure it looks ok, “the perfect union.” She lovingly taps it on the tip of his nose before stowing it away again. “It’s romance, you know?”

Draco nods in acknowledgment, and then the two of them duck their heads, lost in their own worlds. Draco’s mind is swirling with images of Gilderoy Lockhart with his soft yellow hair and invitingly sexual dancing and award winning smile. And Pansy can’t get over the fact that Draco is going to leave her soon, ride off into the sunset with his famous blond lover to Harvard without a care in the world. She grimaces briefly and then smoothes out her face. Draco does not see this, his light grey eyes are dreamy and he bites contemplatively at his red, red lips. 

Eventually, they go their separate ways and Draco makes his way to the full length mirror in storage. He looks himself over, checking where the bottom of his skirt gives way to his thigh, showing off his smooth long legs, hairless and perfect. He pulls at the sweatshirt, lifting it up past his nipples, taking in their rosy appearance, stark against his pale skin, and hard in the stale air. He flicks one experimentally and sighs at the zing of pleasure that runs through his body. Lastly, he looks over his face, gazing into his own clear eyes, the bright red of his lips and the fall of his blonde hair, almost golden in the morning light streaming in through a nearby window. He is gorgeous and Gilderoy won’t know what hit him.

~

In the alien sticker marked bathroom that’s only for employees, Hermione stands in front of the sink and stares at herself in the mirror. Her eyebrows are perfect and her nose ring glints brightly in the fluorescent lights, but her dark eyes are sad and haunted and she can’t stand it. The ghosts of last night, and the past week, and the last couple of years are written on her face and she is so tired. She knows there will be questions from Harry and Sirius and later, Ron, when he finally comes in for work and she doesn’t think she knows how to answer their questions. Her right wrist burns under the bandages, reminding of her what she did last night and how dumb she feels.

Attached to the wall next to the mirror is a box, rusty and old looking with a dirty red sticker proclaiming RHINO in white. On top of the lid lies a pair of scissors, silver and black, clunky and old. Hermione’s eyes dart to them and she barely gives herself a moment to think before she reaches out and grabs them. The scissors clink dully against the layer of rings that adorns Hermione’s fingers as she brings them up to the back of her head and grabs a handful of her hair with the other hand. She opens the scissors and hacks off a clump of hair. Hermione holds a handful of curls into the sink by her pelvis, and begins to really lay into her hair, cutting off handful by handful. 

With much of the left side of her hair in the sink, Hermione moves to the top of her head, her tongue coming to rest between her teeth as she concentrates on her task. When all that is left is the right side of her hair, Hermione looks directly at herself in the mirror, and smiles a bit at the new look. 

With slightly more enthusiasm, she gets the rest of it off. Finally, when all that is left is the roots of her hair, short, uneven, and bristly on her skull, Hermione pulls the electric razor set that Remus likes to keep under the sink. No one in the last year or so has needed to use it, but the option is always nice. She plugs it into the wall and finishes shaving her head, making sure it’s even. Watching her own transformation is such a strange experience, but Hermione feels lighter the more hair she separates from her body. It’s like a weight has begun to process of being lifted and the cuts beneath the bandage on her wrist don’t throb quite as much anymore.

~

Harry continues to glue coins onto the floor, while Sirius has moved on from looking mournfully at Remus’ office door, and instead is playing with his game boy. Harry sits with one left crossed on the floor, and the other hitched up so he can rest his left elbow on it. As he reaches for another coin, he looks over at Sirius on the couch and asks,

“Do you think it’s possible for someone to be in love with someone else and not even know it?”

Sirius doesn’t look up from the machine but answers, “in this life, there are nothing but possibilities.”

“Well, that’s good,” Harry says, looking down at the floor again, and smiling a little, “Because I have to tell Draco I love him by 1:37.”

That catches Sirius’ attention, and he looked directly at Harry before saying, “That’s an excellent time,” very seriously. So seriously, that Harry nods in agreement.

Just then the employee bathroom door opens and Hermione steps out, her nose ring and necklaces glinting lightly from the ceiling lights. Her eyes, ringed with dark makeup, are bright and seem even bigger now than they did before. 

“Wow,” Harry says when he looks up at her entrance. She walks over to the clock in system to mark that she has in face shown up on time for her shift, but ignores him, so he calls out to her, “You did have hair when you went in there, right?”

“It’s still in the sink if you wanna glue it,” she retorts. Before Harry can reply amusedly, he notices bandages wrapped around her wrist as she replaces her time sheet and is started by it. Hermione just looks over at Sirius and smirks, “hey Sirius, is it true you committed the perfect crime?” before walking to the supply room to grab a cash drawer for one of the registers in the front.

“Not entirely perfect,” Sirius says lightly, watching her movement.

“Did you see that, man?” Harry says, not having paid attention to a word of the interaction. He stands up and walks toward Hermione. “No, Hermione, wait a minute.” He says, concern etches every inch of his face and creeps into his words. “What’s with you today?” 

She grimaces, her nose scrunches up, and rubs at her head with her free right hand, “bad hair day.”

“No I mean, with this” Harry continues. He grabs at her arm and tugs down the sleeve, exposing a bandage secured with clear tape wrapped around her wrist, “what is this? What happened?”

Hermione’s face falls, she looks anywhere but Harry’s face, and she pulls her hand away from him, “You know I - I went to rock and roll heaven and I wasn’t on the guest list. Now please move, I have to go to work.” Hermione nods to herself and pushes Harry a bit as she attempts to walk forward and away, but he is having none of it. Harry stands is ground and demands,

“No! Now you tell me what is going on!” Hermione stops, scrubs at her hair again, and looks in in the eyes, her own a bit shiny with what Harry assumes are unshed tears. He had never in his life seen her like this.

“I decided I’d rather kill myself than meet Rex Manning.” Then she gives him a small smile that is more of a sarcastic grimace than anything, “now, excuse me, I’m going.” But her change in demeanor only drives Harry on more determinedly, he wants to give her a hug; he wants to tuck her into bed with a comfy blanket; he wants her never to make that face again; he wishes desperately that Ron were here to make this better and help her smile normally again.

He steps into Hermione’s way again and says, “Listen to me, this isn’t funny. I’m not joking. I’m not gonna let you go outta here until you tell me what’s going on.” 

Harry watches as Hermione pulls herself together. She takes a mini step back, clears her face, no trace of the dark humor or the hurt on it, and says, “Mind your own business.”

Before Harry can even hope to reply, Sirius has gotten up from the couch and is by Hermione’s side in a flash. He lifts his left arm so that his hand rests atop her newly shaved head.

“She’s fine,” he states, scratching a little at Hermione’s head, “she’s amazing,” and then he drops both of his hands to squeeze gently at her bony shoulders through her zip-up hoodie. She ducks to the side and out of his grasp and walks around Harry towards the double-door-ed entranced to the staff room to head back into the storefront. 

“Thank you,” Hermione says quietly as she goes.

Sirius and Harry look at each other once she is gone and it is Sirius who speaks first.

“Harry, she’s in the store,” his eyebrows draw together as he maintains eye contact, “she’s going to be ok.” 

Harry mimics his concerned expression, but in an angrier way. He allows his thoughts to percolate for several seconds before he demands of Sirius, “What’s with you? Yesterday you were normal; today, you’re like the Chinese guy from the Karate Kid,” he pauses, but then asks again, “what’s with you today?”

“What’s with ‘today’ today?” Sirius shrugs and throws the question back, his voice soft and his face so open Harry is at a loss, so he just says,

“I don’t know.”

~

As she walks through the isles towards the cash register, drawer tucked under one arm, necklaces jangling with every movement, Hermione considers the face Harry had made at her and tries to decide if it was genuine care or just pity. She hears Draco say, “oh wow,” as she approaches and knows it’s because of the hair

“Why’d you do that?” he asks when Hermione climbs the two steps onto the platform. She heads towards one of the machines as Draco and Pansy turn around to watch her. Draco pulls a cash drawer out of the register for Hermione to replace with the one she’s holding, and presses it against his sweater adorned stomach as he looks at her with wide eyes. Pansy doesn’t look so shocked.

“I’m just your typical nutty teenager in America,” Hermione says, annoyed, and Pansy rolls her eyes. “Oh, before you guys hear all about it,” she lifts her bandaged arm and shows it off with the other, and a does a little jazz hand.

Draco and Pansy watch her display, both feeling a bit blindsided. Well, Pansy could have guessed that this might have been in the horizon for Phoenix Records’ little Miss Granger, but Draco felt at a loss and the words “That’s supposed to be a joke, right?” tumbled out of his mouth. 

“No, you’re the joke,” Hermione says angrily with a pinch of hate marring her tone. Draco stares at her a beat longer before walking around Pansy and making his way away from the registers. Pansy and Hermione stand in uncomfortable silence and Hermione allows herself to feel a little bad for the casual way she just revealed her self harm and responded - with his history, she should have known to be a little bit more sensitive when it came to this kind of stuff.

“Well, _Sinead O’Rebellion_ ,” Pansy says singsongedly, and then chuckles, “shock me, shock me, shock me with that _deviant behavior_.”

“That is so clever,” Hermione retorts, turning towards the cash machine to fit the drawer in, “you get smarter the shorter your skirt gets.” She smirks a little as she says this.

Pansy looks over at her “And you get smarter the short your hair gets, so it’s probably good you went with that.” As she says this, both of them allow sarcasm to dance across their faces. It’s a strange kind of rivalry, and they enjoy the hurtful banter, it offers an interesting place for them to brush away from of their more negative emotions. As colleagues who do not like each other very much, they do so love to snark at one another. 

“Yeah,” Hermione says, her voice dripping in matching jovial contempt.

“It’s a wonderful look for you, darling.” 

“Thank you.”

The two women break eye contact and return to the machines in front of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * in the movie, it's actually a red bra, but here, i thought lipstick might work better...


	6. Chapter Six

As the morning continues, Seamus gets bored of his cleaning and decides to play some more controversial music. What he chooses is loud and obnoxious and fast, full of heavy guitars and screaming. Once he presses play on the CD player, he jumps off the music station platform and begins dancing along to his selection wildly, throwing his arms every which way and letting the music inform his movements. Several customers join him, jumping and head-banging, their blood pumping, bodies full of energy. Seamus knows that it’s not long before one of his friends decides to exercise their veto power and tries to make the most of it and enjoy the enthusiastic company.

~

Back in the staffroom, Sirius is still sitting on the couch, but he’s getting antsy. His leather jacket is off to the side and his gameboy, which he got a bit tired of is under it. He cast them both away when it all got too stifling. He wishes that Remus would come out again, even if it’s just to yell at him more. He tries not to let the disappointment at his bad fortune and his growing despair about the future of the store and the people that he loves sink too deeply into his thoughts, but the longer he sits there with nothing satisfyingly distracting, the more he dwells. A few times, he has spoken out to the room at large, hoping that Remus will maybe hear him.

“Hello? Remus?,” he says, hopefully pathetically enough that Remus will emerge, “I have to go to the bathroom.”

But Remus is not listening. He’s been on the phone for a while now, trying to figure out what to do about the confounding situation he’s in. Sirius can hear him through the office window, can see his friend moving around and making calls. He wants to call out to him for real and explain what he did and why, but he can’t let go of the fact that Phoenix Records might become a Music Town and that Remus didn’t tell him anything. “I would like to report a robbery,” Sirius hears Remus say into the phone he has tucked between his head and his shoulder since, presumably, his hands are otherwise occupied, “no, I will not hold.” But Remus is obviously put on hold, because he lowers the phone back into its cradle several seconds later.

~

Pansy watches from a distance as the dancing gets more and more out of hand. Seamus is jumping around with his tongue sticking out of his mouth, screaming along to the music, and the patrons of the store that have joined him are not much better. The _normal_ people who are browsing are glancing over at the spectacle with growing annoyance, but look away quickly and try to pretend that they aren’t distracted. People who frequent this store tend to accept that there will always be others who will dance along to the music, engage with the music they consume, and interact with the store and the employees in a way that is just a bit different than they would in other places, even other music/record stores. They try not to judge too harshly.

And that’s something that Pansy has always appreciated, the atmosphere of casual freedom and acceptance, but sometimes, Seamus gets on her nerves, and honestly, this music is atrocious.

“Excuse me, ow,” Pansy mutters as she makes her way through the growing mass of people who are jumping along violently to Seamus’ music, and banging into her every couple of steps “excuse me, ow.” She gets to the music player podium and shuts it off, which causes the little blue alarm to go off a single time. “Veto.” 

“Hey, hey, hey, hey. What’s up with that, Pansy, huh?” Seamus asks, out of breath, as he steps up beside her. The customers who were dancing wildly with him moments earlier are starting to drift away now.

“You know it’s too early,” Pansy says, squinting at him, “it makes the customers all crazy-like,” as she walks away.

“But that’s the whole point!” Seamus says to her retreating form. But then Dean Thomas steps into his field of vision, dressed in his uniform for one of his jobs, Pizza de Pada*, clean but disheveled, and his hair a mess. “Dean!” (at the same time, Dean exclaims, “Moose!”)

“What’s up, dude!” Dean said enthusiastically, “I heard your music playing when I got in, man,” he gestures behind him, “that’s pretty scary stuff!”

“Yeah, it was moshy” Dean says, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet.

“I’m glad to say I made you a tape last night,” Dean continues, holding up a cassette tape in its case for Seamus to take “for educational purposes.” Seamus looks down at the paper slipped into the clear case with a list of all the songs and can’t really read Dean’s almost illegible handing writing, small and cramped as it is. He looks at Dean with such confused puppy eyes that Dean does not hesitate to explain, “Here’s the deal. You start off with a little classical music, a little pookie, a little pocky*. Then you got some, uh, Shaggs on there, and Residents, and a little Floyd and Zeppelin-”

“Floyd is very cool” Seamus interrupts, nodding.

“Yeah, and another cool thing is, I made you these,” Dean holds out to him some weed brownies he made and wrapped in aluminum foil in such a way that it looks a bit like a long burrito. 

Seamus’ eyes go adorably wide and he reaches out for the gift. 

Dean smiles, “They’re my special recipe and you know what that makes. Lots of sugar.” Seamus makes an affirming noise as he sniffs at the aluminum foil. “Now, Seamus,” He steps up beside his friend and spaces his arm around his shoulder. He reaches for the cassette tape and waves it in front of both of them, “You got to understand something here. This music is the _glue of the world_ , Seamus, it holds it all together. Without this, life would be meaningless.” As he speaks, Seamus looks at the tape and then into his eyes, with deep concentration.

And then Seamus remembers what happened earlier in the morning, and says, still holding eye contact with Dean, “Dude, have you heard about Sirius?”

~

Remus is still making calls, this one specifically to a man that he hasn’t talked to in years. “Frank! Joe, Yeah. Sure, yeah. Good, good, you?” he paces in front of his desk, eyeing his drum set which sits patiently across the room with growing longing - his body is filled with so much tension and anger, he wants to let it out. “Uhhuh. Listen, weird question? Can I get a personal loan? By tonight. Nine thousand dollars.” He twists open the water bottle he’s holding, the phone uncomfortably pressed between his ear and his left shoulder. “What are you laughing at?”

Outside his office door, Sirius sits at his couch, Harry is in a tall chair behind him, sketching out a painting he’s been working on of Draco the last few weeks in his sketchbook. Draco is sitting at a table, pouring over at his school work, his sweatshirt has ridden up slightly and reveals the top of his skirt and a long triangle of skin. Harry glances up every once in a while to look at Draco and kind of wishes he could run his fingers along the fabric ridge there and know the warm smoothness of Draco’s body, push the shirt up more and press lightly at the muscles of Draco’s back. Maybe take away some of the pressure Draco has been feeling about school and his father. Maybe offer some reassurances about the future.

But what does Harry know about the future or university or fathers? He graduated from high school a little bit more than a year ago with a disappointing GPA and he hasn’t done much since other than work at this job and make art. They’ve talked a few times about Harry trying to get into art school, but he’s nervous about it, and anyway, he has a steady job and income and he gets to be around his closest friends and Draco almost every day and he definitely doesn’t want to give any of those things up. And he doesn’t want to leave his mom without her son nearby or Remus without an experienced employee. 

It’s not like his mother doesn’t have a life and friends (and maybe a new budding romance, but she hasn’t talked to him about it yet, he just can guess by how often she takes the time to dress up to go out when she didn’t use to, and the little secret smiles that make their way onto her face when she thinks he isn’t looking. And he’s so glad for her because it’s been so long since Dad died and of course they will always love and miss him but Harry doesn’t want her to be lonely any more), but maybe what it is is that he doesn’t want to leave her, in a way that feels only slightly similar to how he doesn’t want to leave Draco. 

Harry’s distracted musings are cut short when Seamus and Dean’s entrance into the staffroom begs for his attention. Since Sirius is sitting directly in the line of sight of the double doors, Dean starts talking to him almost before he is fully through the doors themselves. 

“Sirius, man, I heard you went to Vegas and married a mobster’s wife and now you’ve got a hit on you. Is that true?” He’s holding a plate in one hand and gestures comically with the other. Seamus is a step or so behind him, marveling at the aluminum wrapped sweets in his hands. He grins a little mischievously at his friend's words and dares a glance up at Sirius to see his reaction. As Sirius sighs, he giggles a bit. 

“Not entirely true,” Sirius says with gravitas.

“Outlaw, man,” Dean says as he sets his plate down on the coffee table and straightens up, “we salute you!”

“Thank you,” Sirius says gravely this time, his eyes dancing.

“No problem, man,” Dean waves it away, grinning. Harry watches the scheme, amused, his hand holding his pencil over his drawing absently. Draco merely glances over at the antics, before returning to his work.

Overhead, the speaker, which has been quiet since Pansy turned off Seamus’ moshy music, crackles to life and they hear her voice, dripping with wicked delight.

“ _This song goes out to our employee of the week, Sirius._ ”

“Oooh, a little tribute man,” Dean says, encouragingly, giving him a thumbs up, as _Money (That’s What I Want)_ by the Flying Lizards begins to play. **The best things in life are free, but you can give them to the birds and bees, I want money.** Dean starts to dance along and Seamus wiggles his eyebrows at Sirius before joining in. Sirius crosses his arms but nods to the beat. **That’s what I want (that’s what I want). That’s what I want (that’s what I want)**. Seamus and Dean start out separate from each other, each moving in their own way, but they get closer and closer as the music continues, until Dean is right up behind Seamus, his nose practically in Seamus’ hair and their movements are as in synch as they are ridiculous. 

Pansy’s voice cuts in “ _Sirius wants money._ ” - **That’s what I want** \- “ _Lots of money._ ” - **That’s what I want** \- “ _Remus’ money_.”

Sirius can’t help but smile at it all, but he knows that this is what will finally bring Remus out of his office, and it won’t be pretty. So he allows himself to enjoy it all before it comes crashing down. Seamus turns around faces Dean, they smile and keep dancing.

Remus hears Pansy’s announcement as he sits in his office. When she says his name, he would have been alarmed at her audacity if he was not already so furious. He barely knows what he’s doing with the anger that is fogging his mind as he gets up from his chair, walks into the staffroom, and stomps over the supply room. The song continues to play, **Your love gives me such a thrill. But your love won’t pay my bills, I want money. That's what I want.** as he picks up a large cardboard box and a stack of blue paper and walks back out. His employees watch him. Seamus and Dean stop dancing awkwardly when they realize that everyone’s attention has moved from them to their manager. 

To all of them, he hands a sheet of blue paper, making his way around the room.

“What the hell’s this, Remus?” Draco asks, finally, as Remus gets to Sirius and sets the box down on the couch beside him. He tosses a sheet of paper at Sirius too. The music seems to fade into the background as they all look down what Remus handed out.

“‘Rules and standards for Music Town employee conduct’?” Harry reads out loud. 

Remus hands the rest of the stack to Dean and tells him to put one in each of the employee boxes. 

“Music Town? We’re not a Music Town.” Harry continues.

“No, we’re not a Music Town,” Remus says, as he walks back around the couch and reaches inside the box. He pulls out an orange employee apron, with aggression and drama. “Yet.” There is a beat of silence before almost everyone starts throwing out questions.

“Isn’t Music town a chain?” Seamus asks.

“‘No gum chewing will be allowed inside the store’?” Harry reads.

“They’re turning us into a Music Town?” Dean asks. 

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Seamus asks Remus.

Remus answers him, “Because I was trying to stop it.”

Draco at this point has gotten up from where he was doing homework and walked towards Remus, “What do you mean?”

“I got enough money to make Cornelius an offer. He was going to make me a partner. I could have bought him out eventually.” He says, his words almost running together as he says them, looking at each of them in turn, hoping they will understand this but also why what Sirius had done was so devastating and not to be taken as a joke.

Sirius, having known all this, lets the words wash over him. He pulls an orange Music Town apron from the box himself and holds it against his chest.

“You were going to buy Empire?” Draco asks.

“That’s a good thing right?” Seamus cuts in with a giggle.

Harry smiles, “that would be fantastic.” And this time everyone, save Sirius and Remus, join in with sounds of happiness.

Remus speaks above them all, “you think it’s gonna happen now?!” and they all shut up. He looks down at Sirius, “I have to pay for what Mr. Brilliant here did. It’s over, kids, okay?”

Sirius balls up the apron and says angrily, “Cornelius is _the man_ , Remus”

“Yeah, and ‘the man’ calls all the shots.” Remus stomps the few steps to stand directly in Sirius’ line of sight behind the couch. He says this with vehemence and hopes that the words hurt Sirius as much as they hurt him.

“Damn the man,” Sirius says, looking up at him with intelligent grey eyes that Remus cannot handle right now and for what feels like the millionth time today, he feels so done. 

“Let me explain it to you,” he says. Remus makes his voice soft and patronizing and pointed. He glares Sirius down, “Cornelius’ the man, I’m the idiot, and you’re the screw-up, and we’re all losers.” He looks over at Harry for a moment before taking a step back and glancing over the rest of the room. “Welcome to Music Town.” 

As Remus storms back into his office, Harry and Draco eye nervously at each other - Harry's pencil and sketchbook forgotten; Draco standing uncomfortably stiff - Seamus and Dean share a look as well, but no one looks at Sirius, who is starring after Remus with an inscrutable expression on his face.

~

When Seamus leaves the staffroom, a handful of minutes later, he brings a couple of the blue Music Town papers over to Pansy and Hermione who are at check-out. Dean comes with him to wish the pair a hello and a goodbye, then makes his way out of the store to heads to his morning shift at the Pizza place. Seamus’ not really sure exactly what to do now since he doesn’t really want to clean and they don’t need a third person managing the cash machines. Dean is gone and it isn’t the time to play fun dancing music again.

He is waylaid from his aimless wandering by when a group of boys who are sitting at the bright red couches by the purple-carpeted stairway that leads to the second-floor flag him down. As he sits with them, they ask what the blue sheets of paper he was handing out are about. He explains that there is an ever-growing possibility that Phoenix Records will become a Music Town. Worried by his solemn expression, they ask him to share what that would mean, for the store, for them, for the future.

“The Music Town playlist must be adhered to,” Seamus reads, and then explains, “That means: no Tupac, no Dre, no Cube, no Snoop, no Mr. Big…”

Across the room, Pansy and Hermione are too reading through the Music Town regulations together.

“...no visible tattoos,” Hermione reads aloud, and then bites her lip in frustration.

“No revealing clothing,” Pansy's eyebrows move towards her bangs with incredulity. 

Pansy begins to play at the front her shirt, messing with it a bit so it hides a bit of the cleavage she usually has on display, and Hermione says angrily, “we’re both screwed.” Then she glances over at Pansy’s fidgeting and mutters, “at least you’re used to it.”

“Now Hermione,” Pansy retorts, “don’t be _bitter_. Certainly, with your ever-growing collection of-” she gives Hermione a once over, but Hermione doesn’t look up from the paper in front of her, “-flesh-mutilating silver appendages and your brand-new Neo-nazi boot-camp make-over, the boys will come a-running.”

Hermione reaches out a hand and grasps at Pansy’s arm, still not taking her eyes off the Rules and Standards. “Let’s not fight, let’s just rip.” She lets go and the two of them rip each of their papers up into small, tiny, horrible pieces.

Having sufficiently answered the boys' questions and left them to develop angry, frustrated feelings on their own, Seamus makes his way up the carpeted stairs and then leans on the rail of the balcony when he reaches the top. He looks down at the first floor of the store below him, full of with moving customers and aisles of musical paraphernalia and thinks sadly to himself of the conversation he just had. This is the first place he's ever worked at and he loves it a lot. He doesn't think it becoming a Music Town will change the way it looks all that much, but it will change the way it _feels_. He's always been a bit of a weird kid, he sticks out awkwardly in school, has trouble concentrating on things he doesn't care about it, etc. And when Dean helped him find this place, first as a place to frequent, and later as a place of work, it felt like he found a place that he could feel a bit more comfortable in, where he didn't stand out quite so much. He doesn't want that to change for him or for anyone else.

“But we mustn't dwell,” he says to himself as the Buggles’ song, _Video Killed the Radio Star_ , begins to play on the speakers “no, not today! We can’t!” He steps back from the railing and raises his hands with a small peel of laughter. He skips down the stairs once more, “not on Gilderoy Lockhart Day!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *later in the movie, it shows the actual pizza place logo of the uniform Eddie/Seamus is wearing, but I had some trouble reading it because the font's all wonky, so this is my best guess for the name of the place he works at  
> *I couldn't exactly make out what he was saying right here, so I just typed out what I heard. I don't listen to classical music so I'm not sure if he's referring to something in particular.


End file.
